Martyrdom on demand: if not of use alive, perhaps of use dead?US-backed opposition groups in Russia have so far failed utterly to produce results. Their transparent subservience to Washington coupled with their distasteful brand of politics has left a rather unpleasant taste in the mouth of most Russians. Each attempt to spread the “virus” of color revolution to Moscow, as US Senator John McCain called it, has failed – and each attempt has fallen progressively flatter.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has never been more popular. His ability to weather serial provocations aimed at Russia by NATO has made him a champion against the perceived growing injustice exacted against the developing world by an increasingly militaristic and exploitative West.

So when US-backed opposition groups in Russia decided to gather again this coming March 1, Sunday, many wondered just exactly what they expected to accomplish.

Just before he was jailed for handing out leaflets at a metro station, Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny used his last moments in a Moscow court to record a video urging supporters to join a March 1 protest against President Vladimir Putin.

Navalny’s removal from the “Spring” rally by a 15-day sentence underlined the beleaguered state of an opposition movement that brought 100,000 onto Moscow’s streets three years ago as well as the Kremlin’s unease about the potential for unrest in Russia.

Squeezed by government persecution and Putin’s near-record approval rating, Russia’s opposition is betting that an unfolding economic crisis will spark a spring revolt on a scale last seen at the winter protests of 2011-2012, the largest since the collapse of Communism 20 years earlier. It seeks to draw as many as 100,000 people to the “anti-crisis march” in Moscow, with protests also planned in 15 other cities. They’ll highlight declining living standards and the conflict in eastern Ukraine that triggered U.S. and European Union sanctions against Russia.

The article however, also stated that:

The opposition “hasn’t been this weak for many years,” Stefan Meister, an analyst at the German Council of Foreign Relations in Berlin, said by phone. “Even when we have a growing economic crisis in Russia, there’s still high support for Putin.”

Clearly to match the expectations the “spring” rally was meant to have, to infuse the “virus” US Senator McCain had claimed was intended for Moscow, something drastic would have to be done to change the current calculus.

The prospect of triggering sustainable unrest aimed at the Kremlin was beyond impossible – that is – until the leader of the planned protest was shot dead, practically on the steps of the Kremlin itself in the heart of Moscow.

Boris Nemtsov, was reportedly shot four times in the back on Friday night in a drive-by shooting. His body laid conveniently for media photographers to capture the Kremlin looming in the background.

Russia immediately condemned the killing, with President Putin noting it was an act of “pure provocation.”

Nemtsov’s Questionable Ties to US Agitators

Nemtsov had led US-backed opposition protests for years. In 2012, he was caught literally walking into the US Embassy in Moscow to meet with then newly appointed US Ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul who had serve on the board of directors of Freedom House and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).

Is Vladimir Putin about to unleash bombshell satellite imagery that reveals the U.S. government’s role in carrying out the 9/11 attacks as punishment for the White House’s role in supporting Kiev and encircling Russia?

The new head of America’s state-funded media is facing a wave of criticism after remarks in which he equated RT with jihadists and terrorists. Even the State Department has attempted to distance itself. And of course, the hosts of RT’s various programmes have had their say.

French President Francois Hollande declared on January 5, 2015 that US-ordered sanctions against Russia had to end. On January 7, Paris was rocked by the worst terror attack in many decades, carried out by ostentatiously Islamist operatives against the political satire weekly Charlie Hebdo. Are these events somehow related? And is the real issue more geopolitics than free speech?

A huge flash lit up the early evening darkness, as shown by images taken from a dashcam on a road close to Yekaterinburg. Emergency services refuse to comment cause of extraordinary blast in the dark sky.

Military tensions, cyber espionage accusations, a brewing currency war; with every passing day, the headlines paint a convincing portrait of an emerging cold war between China and the West. But is this surface level reality the whole picture, or is there a deeper level to this conflict? Is China an opponent to the New World Order global governmental system or a witting collaborator with it? Join us in this in-depth edition of The Corbett Report podcast as we explore China’s position in the New World Order.

For those with limited bandwidth, CLICK HERE to download a smaller, lower file size version of this episode.

For those interested in audio quality, CLICK HERE for the highest-quality version of this episode (WARNING: very large download).

Ukraine on tender hooks: The ceasefire brokered last September to stop Ukraine’s civil war is collapsing. Both sides in this conflict appear to be preparing for more hostilities. This is at a time when the country’s economy is facing meltdown. CrossTalking with Rick Rozoff, David Speedie and Michael O’Hanlon.

Anti-Russian protesters in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, pulled down a massive statue of Vladimir Lenin late Sunday, a sign of hardening anger toward the Kremlin in an eastern Ukrainian area where sympathies are split between Kiev and Moscow.

The pro-European protests that swept Ukraine in the winter were accompanied by a wave of Lenin statues being pulled down, eliminating symbolic vestiges of the Soviet Union that had endured after its 1991 breakup. But few such statues were toppled in eastern Ukraine, which has long been a bastion of pro-Russian sentiment and where separatists have embarked on an insurgency that has cost thousands of lives.

As usual with reports from the Western press, the deception can manifest itself just as much from what is omitted as from what is actually said. The Washington Post maintains that those who destroyed the statue were merely “anti-Russian protesters.” In reality, it was a mob led by literal Neo-Nazis of the notorious Azov Battalion – fielded and directed by Kiev’s Interior Ministry itself.

While the Washington Post attempts to claim the statue’s destruction was a manifestation of the people’s will in eastern Ukraine, it was in reality a stunt pulled by some of Kiev’s most vicious, ultra-right, and illegitimate supporters – supporters the West works continuously to obfuscate from public view.